Optometry with Independent Prescribing
Optometry is the eye health profession concerned with examining eyes and visual systems, prescribing corrective lenses, detecting and managing eye disease and referring appropriately to ophthalmology and other medical services. Optometrists are primary healthcare professionals who play a crucial role in the early detection of conditions including glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy and macular degeneration, conditions that can lead to serious visual impairment if not identified and treated early. The extension of optometry to include independent prescribing, which allows optometrists to prescribe medicines for the treatment of eye conditions, significantly expands the clinical role and responsibility of the profession.
At the University of the Highlands and Islands you will study optometry with independent prescribing over five years of full-time study, combining in-person teaching at local campuses and learning centres with digital access to course materials and work-based activities that allow you to gain clinical industry experience. This blended and distributed model is particularly suited to the geography of the Highlands and Islands, where healthcare provision needs to be embedded in communities rather than concentrated in a single centre. You will develop the clinical knowledge, diagnostic skills and prescribing competency needed for the full scope of modern optometric practice.
Graduates register with the General Optical Council as optometrists and work in high street optometry practices, NHS ophthalmology departments, hospital eye services, community health settings and independent practice. The independent prescribing qualification significantly expands the clinical scope and earning potential of qualifying optometrists, and is increasingly sought by employers across the sector. Many optometrists develop specialist interests in areas such as paediatric optometry, contact lens fitting, low vision, orthoptics or domiciliary eye care, and postgraduate study in these areas is available for those who wish to develop specialist expertise.